


Why I Hate Sushi...And Also How I Fell In Love With Daniel "Douche" Espinosa

by rosethorngirl



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Dark Humor, F/M, Falling In Love, Humor, Hurts So Good, Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV) Needs A Hug, Lucifer POV, M/M, Male/Male sex, Story within a Story, lucifer has probs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-09
Updated: 2020-05-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:22:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22623991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosethorngirl/pseuds/rosethorngirl
Summary: See the sad part about it is I already knew it was coming.No, no. I’m not being dramatic.It was inevitable.Simply because while I may be denser than your gran’s chocolate princess cakes in human matters of the heart most of the time…I do have enough self awareness to recognize that generally speaking I’m a fuck up.
Relationships: Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar, Chloe Decker/Marcus Pierce, Dan Espinoza/Lucifer Morningstar
Comments: 22
Kudos: 59





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I have NOT abandoned my ...To Command verse. I am SOOOO sorry it is taking so long to get the next chapter. I am still working on it. I am just so busy anymore I can't even function. This should be about 3 chapters...so when I am posting the 15th go ahead and laugh at me okay? Lol.

See the sad part about it is I already knew it was coming.

No, no. I’m not being dramatic. 

It was inevitable. 

Simply because while I may be denser than your gran’s chocolate princess cakes in human matters of the heart most of the time…I do have enough self awareness to recognize that generally speaking I’m a fuck up.

I mean, not much else to say really. 

We could close the book right here and end it with, “Yeah, he is. Just a total and complete arsehole with too much pride and not enough common sense to not go on and cock everything up he touches. What an utter waste of existence!” and go home. 

Bloody hell, according to some literary sources, that is usually more or less the way I’m explained to you humans anyways.

Big devil. Scary. The source of all evil. Was made the most beautiful of all the angels and had a gift for music. Used to be the favorite. Became too prideful a brat that I got a big ole bug in my britches about wanting to do things my own way and got a celestial spanking for my tantrum, then sent to time out for millennia. Supposedly hate you all and want your soul. Et al. 

I mean it’s harsh and generalized and certainly makes me quite chuffed thinking I’m so broad stroked in people’s minds, but it’s not entirely inaccurate.

Although for the record, I don’t care about your soul and when it’s not depressing it’s rather comical that people could really think I could be the reason for all evil. As if I’d have the time. Humans tend to forget they can be absolute rubbish individuals all on their own without any help whatsoever. 

Truthfully, that’s about where the creative liberties in my personal bio set in. I could not give a piss less what you do with your life. 

I mean, really? 

Go on and be the next Mozart or Da Vinci. Or become a savage world conqueror. Or save the bloody seals! Maybe go climb Everest and die in the frigid fucking cold. Or study ancient history and sell your findings to a museum. Bloody hell, go on and change the world or something. Or don’t. Maybe do nothing with your life at all and collect puppy stickers for all I give a shit. But I can promise you; none of those decisions will be because I made you do anything. 

I am getting horrendously sidetracked and I apologize for those of my audience actually here for a story and not to discuss theological ethics. 

My point is in all of it, is that it’s not as though I’d blame anyone for writing me off here. My big bro would even applaud you as he chimes in about my uselessness. 

So all in all, this could be rather open and shut.

But there’s no flare, no panache. 

No sweeping romance or heartbreaking climax to leave you desperate for more like all those corny Hollywood movies.

We’d miss toe curlingly wonderful se… – sorry – love scenes. (And lie to yourselves all you want, you can’t lie to me. I KNOW you all want to read that.)

So, getting down to brass tacks, I’m here to tell my story. You’re here to read it. So let’s just quit mucking about and get on with the…well, the story of why I really, really fucking hate sushi…and also how I fell in love with Daniel – “Douche” – Espinosa of all Dad forsaken people.

Grab some tea and biscuits and here we go…

My story begins at the precinct two months ago. Truly, I was minding my own business, raiding the snack machine because the Detective’s presence was making my leftover high linger on the intense need for cool ranch puffs, when out of nowhere…

~D&L~

“Lucifer!” Daniel scolds and grabs him by the shoulder, turning him around with a stumble in his step. “What the hell are you doing?”

Lucifer grabs the side of the snack machine to gain his balance with a grimace and glares at Dan with as much heat as he can muster in his current state. “Eating,” he growls out, then adds, “douche. Or trying to till you manhandled me like a ignorant brute.”

Dan scowls at him, “You were breaking into it again, man. You gotta stop doing that.”

“I leave more than enough to cover the damages,” he points out and rips his shoulder out of the other man’s grip with a grunt. “It isn’t as though the lock is broken. And compared to some of the offenses in this Dad-forsaken precinct, I think leaving a couple hundys for some crisps and biscuits is hardly a notable crime. It isn’t though I’m actually stealing anything.” 

Lucifer huffs in indignation as he sweeps his hand over his rumpled suit coat as if the creases the other man put into it made a difference to his overall disheveled state. “The nerve,” he grumbles under his breath.

Dan rolls his eyes and turns to the coffee machine to begin making his morning cup of unpleasantness. “It’s not the point, and you know it,” he sighs out and flips the tap open to rinse out the pot.

Lucifer defiantly reaches once again into the snack machine and grabs his goodies with a tongue stuck out in the Douche’s direction, leaving his customary three hundred dollar bills he always does when he’s in such a state. He doesn’t miss the side eye from the douche and sends him a look in response, which earns him a snort.

Opening the bag of cool ranch puffs and stuffing a small handful all at once in his mouth, Lucifer lounges back against the wall and watches the man with disdain. 

Who exactly does Daniel think he is anyways? His Father? Bah. Always going around disapproving of him and whatever he does, as though he cares what he thinks. There was only one person he actually cared what they felt about him, and they were…

…oh.

Right…

He deflates a little with an audible sigh, suddenly losing both his leftover high and his appetite.

“So,” Daniel says with some significance in his tone after putting the pot back under the percolator and turning around to face the now sullen looking Devil.

“So,” Lucifer huffs in response while staring at the gaudy packaging of the cool ranch puffs, before selecting one far more delicately and eating it significantly slower. It tastes like Hell’s ash on his tongue and he nearly spits it out.

Daniel shakes his head, “Pierce and Chloe, huh?”

“What of it?” Lucifer coughs a little and shifts in his spot, refusing to meet his eyes.

“Must have been a bit of a shock, I mean…I certainly didn’t see it coming,” he rubs a hand over his face.

Lucifer grimaces and pitches the half eaten bag of crisps in the trashcan. “The Detective is free to do whatever she wants to. That includes marrying that-that…” he purposely cuts himself off, knowing present company would never understand. “No matter how idiotic I find this decision, I can hardly say much about it. Seeing as I had my chance and…well…” he sighs and shakes his head.

Once again, present company would never really understand.

“Yeah,” Dan says, much softer, “I know all about missed chances, man. I get it.”

“Actually, you don’t,” Lucifer huffs and the coffee begins to dribble out into the pot filling the rapid silence. 

Dan breathes out between them and looks to the side, clearly thinking something over. 

Lucifer looks straight ahead, thinking back for the millionth time at least in this past hour alone, how his – no, not his – how the Detective screamed at him in that interrogation room a week and a half ago. He will never forget the ripping feeling in his chest, or the resounding clarity falling at his feet of how he had finally gone too far. 

Done too much. 

It was finally over, and it was his entire fault. 

She didn’t believe him. She would never believe him. When he had the chance to prove it, he didn’t. And when his brother warned him of Pierce’s intentions, he didn’t listen. So like a fox loose in a hen house, the damage was done. The fate sealed in stone.

He had pushed her away too much over the course of her partnership to ever find a way back to what may have been – Dad’s meddling in her existence be damned. 

He had well and truly – nay – absolutely and resolutely fucked it all up.

He feels his eyes begin to well and nearly curses. He has been trying for days now to drown out the noise around him with blunt after blunt. Line after line. Shot after shot. 

It’s never enough.

Just like he will never be enough.

“You’re really messed up about all this, aren’t you?”

Startled, Lucifer looks up and fixes Dan with a deer in headlights stare. A denial would be a lie, but he’s not quite with it enough to form a real evasion either, so he sags in defeat and kicks the ground lightly with his shoe as his face pulls back in a pained mockery of a snarl.

“What would it truly matter if I was, hmm?” he truly didn’t care about how cagey he sounded, but he did care that Dan saw the peacocking for it really was. He felt rubbed raw, and he didn’t particularly like it. “As I said, she’s made a choice. I don’t even know why I am discussing this with you.”  
“Because I can understand?” the other man offers.

“You most assuredly cannot,” Lucifer huffs. 

Dan scoffs and parrots in a bad English accent, “I most assuredly can.”

Lucifer heatedly glares at him as he begins to feel his normal state of irritation around the douche begin to settle back in. “You cannot. You haven’t the foggiest idea about me or my life, douche. You – just like everyone else in this Dadforsaken building and everywhere else – don’t even believe me. About ME! About who I am! So how could you understand? You can’t understand knowing that if you humans all did believe me, you’d lose the only people you’ve ever even remotely liked let alone -” he chokes on the words and stops.

His little blow up leaves him feeling hollow and he falls back against the wall as the rage leaks out of his stance and the sorrow settles back on his shoulders. He ignores Daniel altogether and forces himself to get ahold of his emotions before he does something genuinely embarrassing like cry out his frustration in the middle of the precinct next to a snack machine while smelling shitty coffee and all in front of a man who hates you regardless.

“You can’t understand,” he softly says instead, staring at the floor. “You may have had troubles in your life, Daniel, and maybe those troubles seemed insurmountable. But you don’t even have the capability to grasp the measure at which I have been hated. And hunted. And shunned. Beaten. Forgotten. Labeled things that aren’t true and mocked for millennia by-by lies. You don’t know what it means to be really alone.”

“Dude,” Dan says and steps forward. “You aren’t though. Look, no, I don’t even know what half of that even means besides telling me you clearly have issues that a therapist will need another therapist to unsort. But you aren’t alone. Not anymore at least. And Chloe may be all into the Lieutenant right now and yes, it’s really fucking weird, but she’s smart. It won’t go anywhere.”

Lucifer shakes his head. He won’t ever get it, and that isn’t his fault but it surely is frustrating. Dismissive, “Isn’t your coffee getting cold?” Lucifer tries to begin putting their typical cold distance in place when…

“Maybe we can do a guy’s night?” Dan all but spits out between them, saliva and all, looking nearly as shocked as Lucifer is at his suggestion.

Lucifer nearly falls over at the idea. “I beg your pardon?” 

“Guy’s night. You and me,” he repeats as if that explains what a strange suggestion that would be. “Let’s go out together, man. Let me show you that you aren’t alone. We’re both single. We’re both Chloe’s rejects. Let’s just go out together and get really fucking drunk or something tonight. What do you say?”

Lucifer blinks. 

And stares.

And repeats because he’s clearly had a stroke in the last five minutes and he’s suffering irrevocable brain damage, because it sounds like…“You want to go out…with me?”

Dan’s eyes widen as he splutters, “Not like a date!”

Lucifer nods a little bit like a bobble head and says shakily, “Oh.”

“I meant like let’s go out and do single guy things…separately…but together…” Dan squints and shakes his head as he seemingly realizes how stupid that sounded. “Get drunk. You wanna get drunk?”

Lucifer nods, feeling some of the awkwardness eek out of the air and wanting to laugh for the first time in a few days at the Douche’s clear discomfort but not feeling it appropriate. “Very much actually.”

Dan nods, “Super.” He pours some coffee in one of the Styrofoam cups and grabs a couple creamer cups as he starts to leave the break area. “Pick you up at eight.”

Lucifer whirls around, “Don’t you mean I should pick you up? I have the nicer car for a proper club experience!”

Dan half turns and smirks at him, “Nah man. We ain’t doing that. I’ll pick you up at eight.”

“Hmph,” the man formerly known as the King of Hell says to himself and looks down at his appearance, suddenly remembering how much a mess he looks. “Oh dear,” he gasps and bites his lips. 

What has he done?

~D&L~  
Pause tape!

Okay, I feel the need to interject here and remind everyone in this moment of time I had just been rather harshly discarded by the Detective as little more than the lint on her blouse; had gone through a period of no sleeping because my demon decided to terrorize me into thinking I had been sleep guardian angel-ing; and watched the Detective get dumped by Cain the first murderer, only to then turn around, take him back OVER ME and decide to FUCKING MARRY HIM!

So I feel I do deserve some slack as I head into this absolute nutter of a situation.

I mean, go out?

With Daniel?

For a guy’s night?

Like that was something he and I did frequently?

Dearie me. In looking back, I should have known right then and there I was unstable and needed to get my faculties in check.

It must have been the drug binges. That was it. They clearly altered my brain chemistry – if that is even possible – and made me believe that would do anything but end in disaster.

I mean, you know, I have never hated Daniel. 

Found him irritating to the point of nuisance? Yes. 

But hated him? No. 

I’d’ve had to actually care about him more than just as a necessary thread attached to the Detective to find enough energy to hate him. 

…Although that nasty little bit with Malcolm nearly did it.

Anywhosit.

The point I am making here is that part of me feels like I was – dear Dad I hate to say this word – vulnerable here and looking for something I wasn’t going to find. I’m sure Linda is cheering into her wine somewhere that I am admitting this to you lot.

“Personal growth.”

Bah. Whatever that means. The only growth I need right now is the scotch in my glass.

So fast forwarding some here, I wound up going home and taking a very long, very hot shower before spending at least a half hour deciding on my color palette alone for the evening.

Emerald green with gold accents, by the way. Simply marvelous! A sexy beast, that I surely am.

At least I thought I might finally be finding more familiar ground until I found out where he was planning on taking me.

Roll film!


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...hi? How mad are you guys at me? *ducks the tomato* Yeah, that's what I thought. I am sooooo sorry.

“I must say, Daniel,” Lucifer grumbles as he brings his couture coat tighter around his shoulders uncomfortably, “I was certainly not expecting to be brought to a cop bar for your proposed stag night. I thought the purpose of tonight was to get sloshed and forget…” he stops on the thought, feeling the residual of his good mood disappear as he stares up at the blinking neon sign in disdain.

Dan snorts and closes his car door as he shuffles up next to the very dour and unimpressed looking Devil. “It’s poker night, man. You’ll love it,” he encourages him as he takes him by the elbow.

Lucifer scowls at him, but lets Dan lead him forward with only the barest hint of a defiant drag in his step. “If it isn’t strip poker,” he mutters, “I don’t understand the point of this outing. If I had known I was being brought to a place that probably hasn’t cleaned their ice machine in the past decade, I would have at least downgraded from my new Versace to the Ralph Lauren.”

Dan shakes his head with a huff as he pushes open the heavy oak doors. 

The din from the inside drowned out any remark Lucifer might have come up with and enveloped the Devil as he took in the drab interior. As he expected, the place was filthy – and not in the “Mom and Pop’s Hole in the Wall Charm,” kind of way. More like in the “Hell’s Angels biker gang probably shat in a chair and pissed on the pool tables,” kind of way. 

He grimaces and suppresses his shudder. 

Honestly, the place resembles a bar from those dreadful mafia movies. Thick wood tables marred by years of bar fights and abuse, with equally beaten up looking wooden chairs and dark, gauged up walls made up the majority of the space. The place was incredibly busy with overworked looking wait staff – mostly women – rushing about. In the far back corner was a poker table with four men that eerily look like the chaps from the precinct he used to rumble with for defending the Detect… 

– Lucifer scowls to the point of resembling a cartoon cat that just realized his designs on catching that old rotten mouse had just been shot to shit. Of all the ridiculous –

He pulls his arm out of the other man’s grasp and tries to turn around and leave but Daniel only readjusts his grip and pulls him back around. 

“Oh no you don’t! Come on man, this will be fun!” Dan grins at him and the former King of Hell couldn’t be more annoyed if Daniel had just scuffed his new loafers.

“You call this fun?” he all but shouts over the noise. “I thought we were supposed to be forgetting the –…” he grits his teeth and corrects himself, “I thought this was supposed to be about getting drunk and ‘doing single guy things?’ Isn’t that what you said? How is mingling with the reprobates that used to torment...you know who supposed to help me forget anything? What kind of useless wingman are you?!”

Dan rolls his eyes. “So single guys don’t drink and play poker?”

“THIS single guy doesn’t,” Lucifer grouses, “when he has a mission to be half way fucked to Mars before midnight and his supposed gentle-douche has decided his time is better spent hanging around the old bullies of the person he’s trying to forget!”

Daniel actually has the audacity to laugh at him; Lucifer can’t quite believe it as he gapes at him.

“You think that’s funny?” he gasps. 

The other man shakes his head and finally lets go of his arm. “A little, yeah,” he shrugs. “Lucifer, you aren’t going to forget Chloe or how she makes you feel. That is NOT the purpose of tonight.”

The Devil throws up his arms in exasperation. “Then what bloody good was this?”

“To. Get. You. Out, man,” Dan sighs. “You’re sad. Chloe is with Pierce – for now anyways until she wakes up and realizes that she’s making a huge mistake. Knowing her, that’ll be in another few weeks at MOST. But in the meantime, you HAVE to get out man. And not to go fuck around with drugged out club goers, but to be around real people. No more,” and he has the nerve to actually attempt not only a mockery of an English accent, but also large sad eyes for added nauseating affect, “‘I’m so alone, nobody likes me everybody hates me’ routine.”

“It’s not a routine!” he hisses in response. “And I neither sound nor look like a wounded deer in a wooded forest.”

Dan rolls his eyes again, “Can you just trust me? Follow my lead? At the very least because between us I’m the one with experience in being the one Chloe dumps?”

Lucifer thinks that over for a moment before taking in their surroundings once more with another grimace. Truly, it can’t be any worse than scaring off the patrons of his club by singing more Michael McDonald or Radiohead. 

“Fine,” he agrees and straightens his coat. “I’ll follow your lead…douche.”

Dan grins and shoves Lucifer’s shoulder good-naturedly. “That’s the spirit. Let’s get this show on the road!”

He all but drags the reticent Devil to that table in the corner, which turns out to be much quieter. They’re met with a round of greetings until they spot him; then there’s tense silence. Lucifer does his best to keep a cool face, despite the challenge in his eyes aimed in each of the present company’s direction, and while he’ll never admit it he was glad for Daniel’s presence acting as a shield. 

~L&D~

Pause again!

So sorry…you’re probably all bored by now at my blathering on. And…well…it’s not like can blame you, but settle down my horny little toads, I am getting us to the point alright? 

We’re in need of a quick history lesson before we move forward any further because this is rather important to this next bit. And yes, I realize, I should have explained this already. I’ve never claimed to be bloody Hans Christian Anderson in my storytelling, now have I? Pipe down.

You see, if you remember back when I started helping the Detective she was not exactly popular. In fact, she was decidedly very UN-popular due to the little debacle involving our romantic lead here (Daniel) and a completely mental homicidal hell escapee (Malcolm). But never mind the finer details of all that, we all know what happened there.

What was never really flushed out was just exactly how bad it truly was for Chl-the Detective. Just how harassed and verbally abused she was getting in the department. And by none more than these three manky gits and their dearly departed ringleader Paolucci.

Consistently and incessantly, they would go out of there way to make her life a horrendous experience – but only whenever Daniel wasn’t around to see the full scale of their attacks. From the shoves, to the comments, to one time with the dead and rotting fish in her desk drawers – it was utter madness. And yes, essentially it was Daniel’s fault for not telling the truth in all of that, but never let it be said that I was one to blame others for choices one makes. Daniel should have told the truth, but these pikey maggots were to blame for their own vile actions.

Enter me.

Yes, yes. In the early days I was quite the tool as you Americans say. But one thing I have never been is capable of sitting idle as an innocent party gets unjustly wronged or their name dirtied by unrighteous zealots of misguided causes. 

Obviously. 

I’m in therapy for this issue and everything.

Side bar, this is why my half brother Yeshua and I got along so well. 

Do you even know the shit the world put him through just for being a good person who said don’t hate on prostitutes, don’t be a hypocrite, be bloody nice to people, here eat some fish and listen to this story about being grateful for the things you have and not letting your talents my father gave you go to waste…I mean…it’s absolutely outrageous!

Don’t believe what you read there, he and I are fine with one another. And when the misguided people murdered him, I gladly handed him Hell’s keys because I got a three Earth day vacation out of it before Amenadiel kicked my feathered arse back into my throne and took him back to finish the big show for the followers or flunkies or whatever he called them.

Disciples! That was it.

But yes, Yeshua and me – absolutely fine. I think it’s because he was raised by that poor woman and her husband instead of our actual Father. Nice people. Unfortunate about their hovel though.

Sidetracked again, sorry.

ANYWAYS!

While not knowing the specifics of what had been occurring up to my entrance in her life, it became apparent very quickly she was such a person in such a predicament.

No one has ever been able to say I am anything other than a nosy bastard, and they’d be right. So exactly where am I going with this, you may ask? Well…hmm…I may have exacted my own brand of justice on these three that clearly didn’t understand that no one messes with those I call mine and gets away with it very long…no one.

And I may be about to pay for that.

~L&D~

“Guys, you all know Luce, right?” Daniel says neutrally with a smile as they both pull out a chair. 

“It’s Lucifer,” he grumbles under his breath, and situates himself primly, “not Luce.”

The man on the furthest side with a birthmark on the side of his neck and Long Island accent nods warily as he nudges the rather wiry looking fellow closest to him. “Yeah, we know the British big shot. You play poker with us low lives now, or what?” 

Lucifer scowls as he gestures to a waiter to come take his order. “Not actually British, Javi, thank you. But thought I might try and see how my odds fare with you lot for the evening. Deal me in?”

“Now, now,” the wiry man says with a smarmy grin shot toward Javi as he shuffles some cards. “Decker’s little trained attack puppy can’t just come in here and play our hands without a story, amiright Joe-joe?”

Dan stiffens and Lucifer glares more pointedly as he settles into being perfectly still. The now uneasy detective leans forward good naturedly with a placating tone, “Hey guys, he’s just here to play poker alright? He’s got cash he’s willing to burn and - …”

“Nah,” said the third African American man identified as Joe-joe, who had been silent up till then as he takes a swig of his beer. “Kacey’s right. Tell me Espinosa, why you bringing this fancy fairy over here? Isn’t he the one who makes a cuckold outta you?”

Lucifer huffs angrily, “I do no such thing! And call me a fairy one more time, I’ll show you - …”

“Guys!” Dan nearly shouts, and sets his phone and keys down authoritatively. “We want to play poker. Just deal us in.”

The three others look to each other before seeming to make a decision and begin to pass out the cards. Lucifer, on edge and more than slightly annoyed at the turn of his evening, orders a double of their toppest of the top shelf scotch and makes up his mind to leave after the first hand. Daniel, at the very least, seems to realize he may have made an error of judgment by bringing him here so that mollifies him.

“Deal in is $150,” the Javi says after finishing passing out the hands.

Lucifer nearly laughs. “That’s all?”

“Yo, not all of us are some kinda billionaire or zillionaire or whatever you are, man,” Joe-joe snarls. “Rolling up to the precinct in your half million dollar whip.” 

Lucifer scowls back before grabbing his wallet and pulling out a wad of big bills totaling about a thousand bucks, not that he actually counts it. “Let’s make the night interesting then, shall we lads?”

Dan visibly deflates. This is not going to end well. What the fuck was he thinking bringing Lucifer here?

Javi leans back and asks in a sarcastic tone, “What? Going to buy all our hands now? This is poker man. There’s nothing more interesting about it.”

Lucifer grins with a full set of nearly unnaturally sharp teeth at him, “Au contraire, you gannet lot you. You see you’re about to make a deal with the Devil. There’s always very interesting things to be found there – especially for wazzocks like you.”

“Hey!” Kacey growls, “I don’t know what that means, but it sounds like you’re saying something a little insulting. Might want to rethink that.”

Daniel rubs a hand down his face and pulls his wallet out of his pocket to slap the buy on the table. “Can we just play poker?”

Lucifer smirks. “Oh, I’ve thought it through just fine, Officer Gerald Kacey. Would you lot like to hear my offer or not?”

The other three trade suspicious looks while Dan sighs. 

“Fine,” Javi announces. “What’s this offer?”

“Lucifer, don’t,” Daniel says in what he hopes sounds firmer than he thinks it did. 

The former King of Hell doesn’t even spare him a side eye, too caught up in his increasingly entertaining evening. “Before we talk any further, you must understand, deals with me are finite. Meaning, no backsies. No, I didn’t understands. You play, you pay.”

The three – clearly more interested than before – glance at each other. They each give slight nods and shrugs making Lucifer grin.

“Perfect. So then here would be the deal chaps. If I or my compatriot for the night win, than not only will we take this…decidedly meager pot,” he eyes the center of the table distastefully before smirking again, “but you all will owe us each a favor to be named later.”

Dan scoffs quietly and knocks his knee against the Devil’s leg in warning. What the fuck is he doing?

Joe-joe actually laughs. “Owe you a favor? Like what? Pick up your groceries or some shit? Get serious. This ain’t kindergarten.”

“Oh no, no, no,” Lucifer tuts. “My favors are usually more complicated than that. But they are ironclad, and to be named later for something I don’t know – or in this case – WE,” he inclines his head with a piercing stare, “don’t know yet. If I win, you would owe me one. A blank check, if you will.”

Javi raises an eyebrow, seeming the most uncomfortable of the bunch, “Yeah, I don’t know, guys. That’s a little…broad.”

“Deal,” Kacey beams with a self-satisfied smile. “And if we win, you pay us a grand a week for a month. I know you got the money to do it.”

Lucifer leans back a little and considers this as Dan starts to pipe in with a “Now wait a minute…”

“I am to assume you mean $1000 each, correct?” Lucifer clarifies seriously, losing all humor. Deals are not to be entered into lightly, and terms are always to be very clear. 

Joe-joe, taking his cue from Kacey, nods vigorously. “And whatever we got in the center.”

Lucifer hums affirmatively than looks pointedly at Javi. “And you?” he asks. “Do you agree to these terms?”

Visibly uncomfortable, Javi swallows and looks around the table. “We can’t like,” he tries and fails to meet the eyes of everyone around him, “narrow down what your blank check’ll be?”

Dan scoffs in disbelief that this is even happening. “Why can’t we just play normal fucking poker? What is this?”

Lucifer shushes him and turns back to the New York native with a raised brow. “My deals are concrete. I never lie. If you win, per your teams terms, you would each be given individual sums of $1000 American dollars and the contents of the center of this table to be divided amongst you. And if either Detective Douche or myself were to win, we would be BOTH owed a favor to be named later at our discretion and convenience.”

Kacey kicks the uncertain looking Javi under the table, “Come on, man. We’re gonna win. And what’s the worst that happens? They ask you to streak through this bar? Grow a pair!”

Caving, the man looks one last time at Joe-joe and his equally resolute face, and nods. “Y-Yeah, yeah. Okay. Sure. We win? Grand a week for a month and whatever’s in the pot.”

“And our to be determined favor?” Lucifer presses, wanting to make sure he is clear in his demands.

The other man nods again, slightly pale. “Yeah, okay. I a-accept.”

“Marvelous!” the Devil beams. “Now, let’s get playing shall we lads?”

“WAIT!” Kacey says, “if we win, we get all of that plus one other thing.”

Lucifer slowly looks to him and raises a brow.

“We get to get your help on a case of ours. You know, since you’re such a great consultant and Detective and all. I’m sure it will be a piece of cake.”  
“What kind of case?” Dan says at the same time Lucifer nods his head and says “Deal.” They glare at each other.

“You know what man,” Dan scoffs and starts to push away from the table, “you were right. This is a bad idea.”

“Now hold on, this was your idea!” the Devils scolds. “And I am starting to find the merit. Now you want to back out? But we already made a deal.”

Dan shakes his head just as Javi butts in, “and if you both back out now, we’ll just tell everyone at the precinct you’re both a couple of lying weasels who back out on their deals.” He grins. “On second thought, go ahead and back out. We’d destroy what’s left of your rep in a day, Espinosa.”

“There will be NO Dan-cancelling on my watch.” Lucifer scowls at him before pleadingly looking to the detective. “Come on, Daniel. Let’s just do it. It’s not like we’ll lose.” 

Dan is scowling something fierce before sighing out his aggravated breath. “You better be fucking right, man.”

He collects the cards that get put in front of him, by a smug looking Joe-joe a little more aggressively than is strictly necessary. Lucifer, on the other hand, looks to be totally at peace for the first time in days – which gives him slight pause. Although he doesn’t know where the self-proclaimed favor-dealing Devil-man is going with this whole charade of bullshit, he is happy that at least the purpose of the evening was found. Despite how backwards it became.

The game wears on. More cards are dealt. Another game gets plaid. 

Three hours later….

…and the unthinkable happens.

~L&D~

Dan is staring disbelieving into his chocolate malt, bobbing the straw up and down, not quite comprehending how far out of whack the supposed to be fun and lighthearted evening went out of pocket. The man proclaiming himself to be the actual Devil incarnate is sitting across from him eating his French fries with far more elegance than he can ever remember a fry being given. 

They lost. Spectacularly.

If there was a scoreboard for how badly they lost, they’d be laughed off the field. And now, due to their insane agreement they get to assist in-in…well. They don’t actually know yet. But knowing those three, it’s bound to be unpleasant.

“Well,” Lucifer says with a sigh and drops the fry he’d been twirling around on his plate. “That was a load of bollocks, wasn’t it?”

Dan scoffs and stops playing with his straw to run down his face in irritation.

Lucifer observes him with something approaching an apology in his features. “Daniel,” he ventures, “I-…”

“Forget it, man,” the irritated detective waves off. “It’s my fault anyways. I should’ve…well…”

Lucifer’s entire face falls and he stares down at his plate. “Should’ve not taken me out,” he says with sad acceptance and holding up a hand to silence Daniel’s sound of disagreement. “No, really it’s fine, Daniel. I understand. I ruined your night and got you caught up into a deal in my own selfish desire to make the night more interesting. You were just trying to be friendly. I fucked it up. Like I fuck everything up.”

“You don’t…” he stops himself at Lucifer’s sharp look. “…okay look. You had said you didn’t want to do poker. You even tried to duck out and leave and I insisted. Let’s call it even fault.”

Lucifer starts playing with his own straw in his tea as he gives a noncommittal noise. “I’ll speak to the pesky little ingrates tomorrow and get you off the hook. It’s me they want anyways.”

“Why?” Dan asks, confused. “I never have understood what exactly happened there.”

Lucifer, guarded, “What does it matter? They were bothering…you know. And I taught them a lesson. They’re simply trying to cash that in. I’ll figure it out. If there’s one thing my brother is right about me it’s that I’m annoyingly good at finding loopholes. So you needn’t concern yourself any further.”

“Look,” the other man says seriously, “I’m not chickening out of this, Lucifer. I mean it when I say it’s both of our faults. So just tell me what you did so I can expect how bad this ‘case’ is going to be that we have to solve for them.”

Lucifer looks up at him and grimaces. “I may have started a bar brawl, one afternoon. Which may have lead to them trying to trash my car, and that might have caused me to retaliate and knock all three of them out and deposit them in animal onesies in Lieutenant Monroe’s office with various amounts of empty alcohol bottles scattered about and then had Maze find someone to delete their files on their work computer’s hard drives and replace them with episodes of My Little Pony.”

Dan choked, eyes wider than the planet of Jupiter.

“Oh!” and the man known as the Devil continued, “this may have caused them to be suspended for a month during which I may have or may have not left them bags of rotting fish on their beds in their homes…more than once.”

Dan nearly faints.

Lucifer takes his silence as permission to continue and Dan wants to barf. “But truthfully they asked for the fish thing. They DID leave that dead trout in the Detect-…uh in you know who’s desk. So I was merely repaying the favor!”

“Oh fuck,” Dan tries not to hyperventilate.

“I mean I understand the comparison,” Lucifer grouses. “They were implying she was a cold fish. I, on the other, was implying they were –…”

“LUCIFER!” Dan growls and smacks his hand on the table.

The man formerly known as the King of Hell looks up at his compatriot nervously. “Yes?” he plays dumb, hoping that he can’t see the uneasiness behind his eyes.

Dan stares him down seriously, and says in as even and calm a tone as he can, “We’re fucking dead.”

Lucifer huffs and shakes his head. He can’t argue though, because that may very well turn out to be a lie…so instead, he merely calls out, “Check please!”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading this first part! Kudos and comments are always appreciated!! Lot of love <3


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